Serial Killer Trading Cards Gary Ridgway: The Green River Killer
Biography:
Gary Ridgway was born in Salt Lake City, Utah to a controlling, authoritarian type mother and a father who was submissive to his mother. He could never live up to his mom’s expectations and had an IQ of 80, “a slight mental deficiency” and he most likely had an antisocial personality part of the time. At the age of 16 he shoed his first severe act of violence when stabbing a six year old. He had a wife for fourteen years and was a great husband supposedly. The height of his killing was in 1982-1983, but continued for a few years after that until he was caught. He was suspected a couple times but they never had enough evidence to keep him and ended up releasing him a couple times. Finally, he pleaded guilty to 48 charges but claimed he had killed 71. His death sentence was exchanged for his cooperation with locating the remains of his victims. He was eventually sentenced to 48 life sentences.
Victim profiles:
He killed mostly prostitutes, all female, working either on “the strip” or downtown, areas near the Green River. He killed mostly young adults with a couple exceptions of ages between 15 and 30. Their ethnicity didn’t matter. The main theme within his victims was they were mostly prostitutes though because he said they were likely not to be reported missing for a while, if ever. His reason was that he was obsessed with prostitutes and he “hate(s) most prositutes” (Ridgway).
Method of operation:
He had multiple dumping sites where he would put his victims after usually strangling them with a cord and occasionally dismembered them and spread their body parts in an area. He liked driving past the areas because it gave him a high. The first few were near the Green River.
Gary Ridgway: The Green River Killer
Biography:
Gary Ridgway was born in Salt Lake City, Utah to a controlling, authoritarian type mother and a father who was submissive to his mother. He could never live up to his mom’s expectations and had an IQ of 80, “a slight mental deficiency” and he most likely had an antisocial personality part of the time. At the age of 16 he shoed his first severe act of violence when stabbing a six year old. He had a wife for fourteen years and was a great husband supposedly. The height of his killing was in 1982-1983, but continued for a few years after that until he was caught. He was suspected a couple times but they never had enough evidence to keep him and ended up releasing him a couple times. Finally, he pleaded guilty to 48 charges but claimed he had killed 71. His death sentence was exchanged for his cooperation with locating the remains of his victims. He was eventually sentenced to 48 life sentences.
Victim profiles:
He killed mostly prostitutes, all female, working either on “the strip” or downtown, areas near the Green River. He killed mostly young adults with a couple exceptions of ages between 15 and 30. Their ethnicity didn’t matter. The main theme within his victims was they were mostly prostitutes though because he said they were likely not to be reported missing for a while, if ever. His reason was that he was obsessed with prostitutes and he “hate(s) most prositutes” (Ridgway).
Method of operation:
He had multiple dumping sites where he would put his victims after usually strangling them with a cord and occasionally dismembered them and spread their body parts in an area. He liked driving past the areas because it gave him a high. The first few were near the Green River.
Sources:
http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/serial_killers/predators/greenriver/bodies_6.html
http://www.dirjournal.com/info/americas-famous-serial-killers/
http://www.altereddimensions.net/crime/GreenRiverKiller.aspx